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Citizens emerge from the slums
Do the world’s nearly 1 billion urban poor, who subsist without legal housing, reliable water and sewer infrastructure, and predictable employment, lack political engagement as well? Ying Gao does not buy the claim by many social scientists that social and economic marginalization necessarily means political marginalization. “My results contradict the prevailing wisdom about slums and […]
Study: Global cancer risk from burning organic matter comes from unregulated chemicals
Whenever organic matter is burned, such as in a wildfire, a power plant, a car’s exhaust, or in daily cooking, the combustion releases polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) — a class of pollutants that is known to cause lung cancer. There are more than 100 known types of PAH compounds emitted daily into the atmosphere. Regulators, […]
End-to-end supply chain transparency
For years, companies have managed their extended supply chains with intermittent audits and certifications while attempting to persuade their suppliers to adhere to certain standards and codes of conduct. But they’ve lacked the concrete data necessary to prove their supply chains were working as they should. They most likely had baseline data about their suppliers […]
Reflecting on September 11, 20 years later
The 20th anniversary of the attacks of September 11, 2001, is an occasion to look back on the American response to the atrocities, how and why they occurred, and what the implications are for future global policy dealing with terrorist groups. The long war in Afghanistan, a war-torn country that harbored Osama bin Laden and […]
Smarter regulation of global shipping emissions could improve air quality and health outcomes
Emissions from shipping activities around the world account for nearly 3 percent of total human-caused greenhouse gas emissions, and could increase by up to 50 percent by 2050, making them an important and often overlooked target for global climate mitigation. At the same time, shipping-related emissions of additional pollutants, particularly nitrogen and sulfur oxides, pose […]
New device can diagnose Covid-19 from saliva samples
Engineers at MIT and Harvard University have designed a small tabletop device that can detect SARS-CoV-2 from a saliva sample in about an hour. In a new study, they showed that the diagnostic is just as accurate as the PCR tests now used. The device can also be used to detect specific viral mutations linked […]
Using graphene foam to filter toxins from drinking water
Some kinds of water pollution, such as algal blooms and plastics that foul rivers, lakes, and marine environments, lie in plain sight. But other contaminants are not so readily apparent, which makes their impact potentially more dangerous. Among these invisible substances is uranium. Leaching into water resources from mining operations, nuclear waste sites, or from […]
Call for Proposal: Skoltech-MIT Next Generation Program
Skoltech and MIT announce the 4th Call for Proposals for the Next Generation Program (NGP) consisting of joint projects. This call is for PI-initiated projects in research, education, and/or innovation. A team jointly led by a PI from Skoltech and a PI from MIT may submit a single, integrated proposal in one or more of the […]
2021 Teaching with Digital Technology Awards honor MIT educators’ innovation and empathy
This June, 23 faculty and instructors from over a dozen departments, labs, and centers across MIT were honored with Teaching with Digital Technology Awards in an online celebration hosted by the Office of Open Learning. Established in 2016 and co-sponsored by MIT Open Learning and the Office of the Vice Chancellor, these awards were originally […]
SMART researchers develop a method for rapid, accurate virus detection
Researchers from Critical Analytics for Manufacturing Personalized-Medicine (CAMP), an interdisciplinary research group at the Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART), MIT’s research enterprise in Singapore, have developed a new method for rapid and accurate detection of viral nucleic acids — a breakthrough that can be easily adapted to detect different DNA/RNA targets in viruses […]